Healing Foods for Health All Winter

It’s especially important to eat warm, nutritious foods with vitamins, minerals, and healthy fats in the winter, since winter is the season when colds, flu, and other viruses can take hold. While you may want to take vitamin supplements, you can also protect your health by eating lots of colourful vegetables, such as spinach and sweet potatoes, and healthy proteins such as oily fish (like mackerel and salmon) or chicken.

Bone broth

Bone broth or bone stock has been an important and nourishing part of many cultural diets over centuries. Made from simmering bones from animals such as chicken, duck, or beef until they break down and release the collagen and other nutrients inside, bone broth can be turned into delicious soups or eaten on its own. Bone broth is high in protein and amino acids, making it good for your digestion, bones, joints, and anti-aging.

Some recipes that use bone broth include seollangtang (Korea), pho (Vietnam), and chicken noodle soup (Europe/North America).

Vitamin C

Some people feel that consuming foods high in vitamin C, such as lemons, oranges, potatoes, and tomatoes, helps boost their immune system so they do not get sick as easily or as badly as they would without taking vitamin C. You can also find chewable vitamin C tablets at the grocery store.

Vitamin D

Because Canada is so far north, our days become very short in the winter, and we do not get many hours of sunlight each day. This lack of sunlight means that most Canadians do not get enough vitamin D, which is an important vitamin that helps with building and maintaining strong bones and teeth. A good vitamin D supplement can be found at the grocery store, but you can also get vitamin D by eating red meat (beef or pork), oily fish (mackerel, salmon, sardines, or herring), liver, and egg yolks.

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